Water-swellable clays have a great number of industrial uses that rely upon the ability of the clay to absorb many times its weight in water, to provide a gel structure of sufficient strength to hold solids in suspension, and the ability of the water-swellable clays to act as a binder in forming sand molds in the metal casting industry and in pelletizing finely divided ores, e.g. iron ores, such as taconite. Some of these industrial uses are generally described below.